Indian Occupation -- The Iroquois and Abenakis -- Claims of the Indians
to Lands -- Evidences of Iroquois Occupation -- Rutland County Before the
Revolution -- First Records of ExplorationCross and Melvin's Expeditions
-- Vermont Debatable Ground in the French War -- Military Roads -- The
Road from Charlestown, N. H., to Crown Point -- Elias Hall's Statement.

In the preliminary chapter of this work considerable
allusion has been made to the colonial history of this region; this fact,
and the no less important one that the details of that period have passed
into general history and are inscribed in hundreds of brilliant pages,
must be an excuse for the comparatively brief space which we here devote
to the subject.

The rich alluvial lands along the Otter Creek and other streams
of this region offered the most favorable fields for hunting and fishing,
and some of the Indian tribes doubtless made this country a place of residence
or resort. At the time of the first discovery of Vermont by the French
nobleman, Samuel CHAMPLAIN, in 1609, the powerful Iroquois were its nominal
possessors; they were probably trespassers on the territory of the Abenakis,
or Canadian Indians, by whom they were eventually expelled. Evidence of
its original populousness does not rest entirely on tradition. Indian mounds,
tombstones and various memorials of aboriginal life and death were found
on the territory occupied by them. Along the valleys and over the mountains
doubtless passed successive generations of aboriginal inhabitants, with
no chronicler to note their comings and goings. In this district of the
country they planted their corn, hunted, lighted their council fires, planned
their tribal wars, wooed, wed and wasted away in age and death, as much
unheeded and unknown by the civilized world as the successive growths of
the dark and gloomy forests they inhabited.

Frequent petitions have been made to the Legislature by the descendants
of the Iroquois asking remuneration for lands once owned by their nation.
The first petition was presented in 1798, a second in 1812, and renewed
in 1853. A commissioner was appointed who made a full report upon the Indian
claims, and they were registered. This territory has also been claimed
by the Caughnawagas, a branch of the Mohawks, whose principal seat was
at Albany, though they had temporary residences here, to which they annually
repaired for the purpose of hunting and fishing. Their descendants now
exist in tribes at St. Regis, in Franklin county, N. Y., and at Sault St.
Louis, near Montreal. They claimed a conveyance of a tract of territory,
the boundaries of which are thus described: "Beginning on the east side
of Ticonderoga, from thence to the great falls on the Otter Creek, and
continues the same course to the height of land that divides the streams
between Lake Champlain and the River Connecticut, from thence along the
height of land opposite Missique, and thence to the bay."

There are evidences that every year large numbers of these tribes
were seen in their canoes ascending the Otter Creek to their favorite hunting
grounds, wherein they constructed small huts and there took up their abode
during the season favorable for the prosecution of their usual employment.
The question what Indian nation first occupied and owned western Vermont
has not to this day been fully settled, and still remains an historical
problem.

Notwithstanding the patient investigation of the subject of the
original Indian occupation, much that is unreliable has doubtless been
handed down in tradition from generation, to generation, especially in
respect to the earlier dates; but in regard to the origin of the Iroquois,
the localities of .their residence, and their principal wars and conquests,
the successive transmitters of their history could hardly fail of being
essentially correct. We may, therefore, confirmed as it is by many circumstances
found to exist on the advent of the Europeans, set it down as an established
fact that the Iroquois originated in the northwest and gradually extended
themselves over the southeastern portions of New York to the upper parts
of the Hudson and finally to Lake Champlain, and some distance at least
into the country east of it. The conclusion is also established that they
could not have reached and become possessed of western Vermont much before
the French found their way into the St. Lawrence in 1535, since their conquest
of the Mohegans did not take place till about the time North America was
discovered by the whites, and it may be reasonably supposed that many years
elapsed after their conquest and possession of the rich and extensive Mohegan
territory southeast of the upper Hudson before they pushed northerly on
to Lake Champlain to engage in a new war with the Abenakis, which should
wrest from them their territory in the Champlain and Otter Creek valleys.
It is equally evident they relinquished their possessions between 1740
and 1760 or about the period of the settlement of the State.

Rutland county prior to the Revolution was unsettled and was predatory
ground. Up to 1760 the territory was almost an unbroken wilderness. A few
men from Massachusetts had located at "Dummer's Meadows," on the Connecticut
River, near Brattleboro; others had built a few block-houses and commenced
clearings at several points farther north. Some French Canadians had built
temporary residences at Chimney Point, on the shore of Lake Champlain,
in the present town of Addison. But till the commencement of the French
War a large proportion of this region was little known to civilized men,
few of whom had ever penetrated its mountain fastnesses. Such was the condition
of this section of the country and such were its inhabitants at the first
approaches of civilization. The only known and authentic records of the
explorations of the territory embraced in this county were the diaries
kept by James CROSS and Eleazer MELVIN. The former made his journey in
April and May, 1730, and the latter in May, 1748, but this region of country
did not begin to be generally known till 1754, when a series of operations
began which eventually changed its whole physical aspect and brought a
hardy race of civilized men to settle and open the territory.

Mr. CROSS made his tour of observation, starting from Fort Dummer,
April 27, 1730; he traveled up the banks of the Connecticut to Bellow's
Falls, to the falls in the Black River at Springfield, and thence by Ludlow
and Plymouth Ponds, until Arthur's Creek - Otter Creek - was reached, on
Sunday, the 30th. The party then made canoes and sailed down the creek
to Gookin's Falls, at Center Rutland, and thence to Sutherland Falls and
onward down the creek until Lake Champlain was reached. The canoes were
carried around all the falls.

The MELVIN expedition, composed of eighteen men, passed through
this territory eighteen years afterward, and followed nearly the same route;
he started on a military expedition May 13, 1748, from Fort Dummer, continued
up the Connecticut to Number Four (Charlestown), and then followed
the Black River. On the 19th the party "crossed several large streams,
being branches of the Otter Creek." Saw many signs of the enemy, both old
and new, such as camps, trees girdled, etc. On the 20th they marched over
the Otter Creek and around the Sutherland Falls. Further along they found
several camps of the previous winter and beaten paths made by the enemy.
On the 24th they came upon a camp fenced in with a very thick fence, where
was found a keg of about four gallons which appeared to be newly emptied
of wine, as plainly appeared by the smell, and about twelve pounds of good
French bread. They reached Lake Champlain and this point on the 28th, and
had a skirmish with a party of Indians. They then began a retreat, being
pursued by about one hundred and fifty of the enemy. They again came to
the banks of the Otter Creek, in Pittsford, about a mile below Sutherland
Falls and marched to Center Rutland where they camped. Thence they followed
up the Otter Creek to the head of one of its branches. Before arriving
at Fort Dummer Captain MELVIN's party had another skirmish with the enemy,
and his party was scattered and four men killed, one wounded and one taken
prisoner.

During the struggle between France and England for territorial possession
the settlements of the French were separated from the colonies of New York
and New England; Vermont only separated them. Its territory was, therefore,
frequently passed over by military expeditions to Canada, the American
soldiers traveling the wilderness by means of paths indicated by marked
trees. Army supplies could only be transported in packs on horseback, and
even this was accomplished with much difficulty. The route from Canada
to the Connecticut was by the way of Lake Champlain and Black River. There
was an old path which was called Indian Road.

Massachusetts, feeling the necessity of a road for facilitating
the military operations of the government, in 1756 considered the feasibility
of constructing a military road between the Connecticut River and Lake
Champlain opposite Crown Point, and the Legislature of that State made
provision for a survey to ascertain "the distance and practicability of
a communication between Number Four, on the Connecticut River, and Crown
Point by the way of Otter Creek," and that the course of the creek, its
depth of water, its falls, the nature of the soil and the growth of woods
near it, should be reported. A fort was also projected on the height of
land between the Black River and the Otter Creek, the surveys were made
to the top of the Green Mountains, but there was no attempt to build either
the road or the fort, the pending hostilities rendering it hazardous. In
1759, however, a military road was laid out by General AMHERST, from what
is now Charlestown, N. H., to Crown Point. The enlisted men of New Hampshire
and Massachusetts were quartered at Crown Point, and the object of building
the road was for transporting troops and baggage between the two localities
named. Two hundred men, under the command of Captain John STARK, entered
upon the construction of the road. The work began at Crown Point and a
good wagon road was first constructed to the Otter Creek. Lieutenant-Colonel
HAWKS then cut a bridle path over the mountain, but did not complete the
work; the reason for his abandoning his purpose has never been explained.
In 1760 New Hampshire soldiers constructed a new road from Number Four
to Ludlow where the bridle path of Colonel HAWKS ended. They followed the
bridle path to Otter Creek and thence on to Crown Point. They could transport
the military stores in wagons to Ludlow and thence by bridle on horses.
There were two branches, and the first branch was only in use prior to
1759, passing through Rutland, from what was called the Little Falls, and
Center Rutland. The second branch ran north from what is now Main street
in Rutland, going north and intersecting the first branch in Pittsford.

Mr. Elias HALL, whose father was in the army of General AMHERST,
made some years ago substantially the following statement: When nineteen
years of age he accompanied his father to look over the scenes of his father's
military service. Crown Point and Chimney Point being only half a mile
apart, the old French road starting on the Vermont shore of the lake, his
father traveled the route on his way home from the fort in 1759, and passed
through East Shoreham and Whiting. Fort Mott, at Pittsford, was on the
line of his route and near the road from Pittsford to the corner of Main
and West streets in Rutland, where another fort is understood to have been
located; thence the route ran through Clarendon, Shrewsbury, and Mount
Holly, Ludlow, Cavendish and on to Number Four, (or Charlestown, N.
H.) This is a description in brief of the route of the old French or
military road connecting Crown Point with the Connecticut River. The details
of this route along the various points it passed and its boundaries will
receive further attention in subsequent pages. Many towns, however, have
claimed to have been on the line through which it did not go, especially
in the western section of the county.